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A Greentrax Recordings Bestseller

Album Of The Year 2006 - Scots Trad Music Awards

(July 2006) 12 tracks: Heart Of America * Winds Of Our Times * Harvest Wind * Strangers To The Pine * October Song * Cha Till * Maireadh Og * Raglan Road * Rabad A Bhaigh * Love Will Never Die * Where The Roses * Puirt A Beul.

A new studio album from the former Runrig frontman, Donnie Munro - his first for four years. He has been recently been touring solo and with The Donnie Munro Band, and has a large and faithful following both at home and abroad, particularly in Germany.

The album is centred on themes of migration and movement emerging from the title track, Heart Of America. This song was written following a journey across the north eastern states of the US with his wife and two youngest children, at the height of the Iraq War, and an earlier visit to Ellis Island immigrant reception centre.

Donnie performed live to the nation from Edinburgh Castle at Hogmanay 2005, leading a ‘choir of millions’ in the poignant singing of Auld Lang Syne from Edinburgh Castle, and from Hampden Stadium during Scotland’s football matches that year. Other highlights have included Aberdeen’s Millennium Celebrations with Big Country, Glasgow’s Hogmanay with Snow Patrol, the closing ceremony of the Special Olympics and the Celtic Connections festival. He also performed with Scotland’s International Rugby team on the song Down Under, commissioned for the World Cup Series in Australia.

This is Donnie's third studio album since his departure from Runrig in 1997, following a major European tour and three memorable farewell concerts at Stirling Castle, where over 25,000 fans came to celebrate - a tribute to Donnie's contribution to Runrig's phenomenal rise from Scottish West Coast dance band to European stadium fillers.

Highlights for Runrig then included playing Hockenheim Stadium to 140,000 with Genesis, to 120,000 with the Rolling Stones in Holland, three nights at Edinburgh Castle, and the Night At The Loch concert to 50,000 fans on the banks of Loch Lomond. Donnie's prominence during that period accorded him a very special place in Scottish life and for many, his voice became synonymous with a sense of Scotland itself.

Since his Runrig days, Donnie has also been deeply involved in the development of his native Gaelic language and culture through his work with Sabhal Mòr Ostaig, the Gaelic college on Skye.

The album also features Blair Douglas, Richard Macintyre of Stereoglo (guitar), Duncan Chisholm of Wolfstone (fiddle), Fraser Fifield (saxophone) and Vivien Scotson (vocals).

"I approached this album in a very direct way, with the songs at the centre of everything and everything being performed live, simply and directly... I was deeply moved by the whole idea of migration, displacement, travel, hardship and opportunity and the very contradictory nature of the images America has presented throughout its history - this all tied in to themes and ideas of which many are very much a part of the social history of my own people in the Highlands and Islands." (Donnie Munro)

People who bought this title also bought:

Donnie Munro - An Turas (The Journey) Live (CD)
Donnie Munro - Across the City and the World (CD)
The Best Of Donnie Munro (CD)
Donnie Munro - Down Under (CD)
Donnie Munro - On The West Side (CD)
Donnie Munro - Gaelic Heart (CD)
Runrig - Searchlight (CD)

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